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[Jeff Prankev]

Hey everyone,

While visiting some nightclubs around Europe I noticed that many of them (Berghain in Berlin, for example, with their Function-One system) arranged their speaker stacks around the dance floor aimed inward rather than having them all in a row facing in one direction.  On paper this strikes me as a bad idea due to phase issues, but it sounded amazing in most cases and they were able to keep the sound levels a bit lower and still fill the space very well, though some were really loud too.

I've been chatting with a local production company here in Canada to try this at some electronic music events that I'm planning and am getting quite a bit of resistance from them due to the phase concerns mentioned above.  Is there a trick to doing this?  Is it worth trying in a relatively small space (100-200 person capacity)?  I liked the way that sound really focused in on the dance floor area and didn't require a high level to make it feel loud, but I understand that there could be resulting issues from having speakers aimed at each other. 

Anyone have any experience with setting up configurations like this?

Thanks for your advice!

[Ivan Beaver]

Hey everyone,

While visiting some nightclubs around Europe I noticed that many of them (Berghain in Berlin, for example, with their Function-One system) arranged their speaker stacks around the dance floor aimed inward rather than having them all in a row facing in one direction.  On paper this strikes me as a bad idea due to phase issues, but it sounded amazing in most cases and they were able to keep the sound levels a bit lower and still fill the space very well, though some were really loud too.

I've been chatting with a local production company here in Canada to try this at some electronic music events that I'm planning and am getting quite a bit of resistance from them due to the phase concerns mentioned above.  Is there a trick to doing this?  Is it worth trying in a relatively small space (100-200 person capacity)?  I liked the way that sound really focused in on the dance floor area and didn't require a high level to make it feel loud, but I understand that there could be resulting issues from having speakers aimed at each other. 

Anyone have any experience with setting up configurations like this?

Thanks for your advice!

In smaller spaces it can work.  But in larger spaces it really starts to screw with the sound-due to the longer arrivals.

The whole idea is to "surround yourself with music".

Which sounds good-until you realize how slow sound moves.

In a larger space the sound gets really smeared and starts to sound like echoes-depending on where you listening from.

In the middle it can be good and quite cool, but off to any side or front or rear it starts to get really messed up.

So it depends on where the priority is.

Of course loudspeaker manufacturers LOVE the idea and like to push it.

This is because they will sell more loudspeakers for a given job.

But when they do that-they are basically saying they don't care about sound quality-at least in terms of accuracy to what the artist is doing.

[Randy Pence]

But when they do that-they are basically saying they don't care about sound quality-at least in terms of accuracy to what the artist is doing.

For typical nightclubs, I disagree.  There is more to the experience than simply being enveloped by the sound.  FRom the get-go, the djs play the source tracks at different speeds and pitches than the producers released them, and will blend the intros, outros and whatever else with other tracks.  The inherent distortion of vinyl is still seen as superior to the source files.

 A club like Berghain is a far cry from the more commercial experiences where the visual focus is only around some dj on a stage surrounded by video walls and whatever else.  There, the dj is not visually focused on as much, the audience looks and dances in every direction and everyone would rather be in more of the direct than reverberant field.  Since sound is always a series of compromises, for this kind of experiences, absolute phase accuracy is sacrificed by evening out the pressure around the dancefloor.  These kinds of spaces rarely have ceilings high enough to fly speakers in a manner which truly allows a minimum inverse sq loss across the dancefloor from just a stereo hang.

For a real world example, I did a demo with 4 danley sound labs sh-46s far, far below their acoustic limits for a dancefloor quite simialr in size to what the OP is interested in.  We first arrayed the speakers from 2 points.  Across the dancefloor was a wall which of course reflected the sound.  The production company I did the demo with said that the would create something of a virtual surround system.  The potential customer heard it and immediately asked about splitting the tops because the volume levels were not even when walking the floor.  Upon doing so, the overall experience improved significantly, even when the horns were not really aimed properly due to rigging restraints.

From my salad days at Twilo in NYC to now, properly designing 4-point+ systems for dj oriented dancefloors has been part science, part art, part luck of what the venue offers.  Start off with what area needs to be covered.  It is probably rectangular in shape, so something close to 360 degrees of horizontal coverage will be necessary.  Orient 4 points of sound in the corners of hte dancefloor, get the mid-high horns around at least 3m off the ground and aim them at the center of the dancefloor, taking care to cover the near-field areas closest to the speakers, too.  Berghain fails at this - the mid-high horns are too high off the ground for their given vertical coverage and the closer to the stacks one is, hte more likely they are going to get that frequency content from across the floor.

Something Ivan has often gone on about regarding how to measure speakers, is that too close to a speaker, the box itself impacts the real-world accuracy of hte measurements when speaking of longer frequency wavelengths.  I've not had hte chance to measure this myself in smaller rooms, but I have a feeling something similar is going on which makes additional points of sound more useful with respect to 80-200hz.  Danley subs (granted, a lower frequency range), for example, are measured 10 meters away, but most nightclub dancefloors are not measured in the tens of meters.  Berghains dancefloor is only roughly 15m x 15m, and the OP might have noticed that there are 2 flown arrays, which sorta fill in zones which have too noticeable pressure zones from the rest of the areas  much closer to the groundstacks.  I have a feeling that they could  have simply flown the mid-high sections from the stacks a bit higher and forming more of a square than rectangle and the additional arrays would not be "necessary."  The flown sections were added many years after opening.

So let's say that side-fills do help for maintaining pressure around the dancefloor, now what?  Add delay and turn them down until highs sound like they come from the outer corners.  How wide of coverage should the sidefills have? Depends on the coverage of the corners and room itself.  One space I did, had tops available which had around 70 degrees of horizontal coverage per speaker, often dipping below that.  The main dancefloor area was about 9m x 6m and then midway between the ends and about 5m from the dancefloor I added fills.  This system was ranked only behind berghain for some 2005 local berlin magazine poll.

For the OP, this should be comparable to the size of dancefloor you are looking to do.  Are you flying speakers?  Putting them on tripods?  What kind of SPL are you going for?

[Jeff Prankev]

In smaller spaces it can work.  But in larger spaces it really starts to screw with the sound-due to the longer arrivals.

The whole idea is to "surround yourself with music".

Which sounds good-until you realize how slow sound moves.

In a larger space the sound gets really smeared and starts to sound like echoes-depending on where you listening from.

In the middle it can be good and quite cool, but off to any side or front or rear it starts to get really messed up.

So it depends on where the priority is.

Of course loudspeaker manufacturers LOVE the idea and like to push it.

This is because they will sell more loudspeakers for a given job.

But when they do that-they are basically saying they don't care about sound quality-at least in terms of accuracy to what the artist is doing.

Thanks for your reply!

That's kind of what I figured; most of the spaces I've seen use this type of installation are relatively small; less than 1000 person capacity rooms with quite varying dimensions.  They sounded better than a lot of mono directional systems I've heard around here but that could be due to a lot of other reasons too I suppose...Berghain in Berlin and Stereo in Montreal have pretty high end systems installed.  I might just have to try it once and see how it works out!

[Jeff Prankev]

For typical nightclubs, I disagree.  There is more to the experience than simply being enveloped by the sound.  FRom the get-go, the djs play the source tracks at different speeds and pitches than the producers released them, and will blend the intros, outros and whatever else with other tracks.  The inherent distortion of vinyl is still seen as superior to the source files.


For the OP, this should be comparable to the size of dancefloor you are looking to do.  Are you flying speakers?  Putting them on tripods?  What kind of SPL are you going for?

Wow, Thanks for the detailed reply!  I'm glad to hear from someone who has experience with these setups and the context in which I want to try it. 

The venue I'm thinking of using for this series of events has ceilings too low for flying speakers, so tops typically are  on top of the bass bins, though no other promoter has done anything other than a mono directional wall of speakers in this space. 

In a 4+ point system, do you put subs around the dance floor as well?  Being that subs are basically omnidirectional, does it make any sense to do that or is it just tops that should surround the dance floor?  If subs should just be in one general location, I'd use tripods to mount the tops, otherwise I would likely put a stack of speakers at each point.  The dance floor at this venue is small, probably about 30-40 meters squared or so depending on how you arrange the dj booth and sound system. 

I would prefer SPL to be a bit on the lower side; I'm not as interested in tearing everyone's heads off as much as I am in providing an immersive audio experience.

PK Sound are typically the best rigs we can get around here I think, not sure how well known they are on these forums since I'm new here.  I will likely be contacting my friends there for more information on how best to set this up.

[Randy Pence]

For 4+ systems, I generally have also split the subs.  There is the truth that the subs interact negatively with the increased sources, but rooms themselves do what they want with cancellations as the waves bounce around.  Splitting the subs allows more of the kickdrums to align with the portion sent to the tops.  For better or worse, dance music dancefloor experience is centered around that pulsing kick, something you experienced at berghain for sure.  There is a local company here which will stack their subs in some point which pressurizes the room more evenly, but do not really line up with the tops.

For the latest project I've been involved in, we flew one monster sub (danley sound labs bc-415) and 4 tops (danley pg-96) for a 12m x 15m dancefloor and think that experience could unseat berghain when the place finally opens.

For one venue I spent a long time in, I had 8x single 18" reflex subs and tried everything from even splits to one cluster in different formations and what worked best was to stack two of them in 2 corners and run 4 in a line along the middle of the opposing wall.  It just depends.

[Randy Pence]

The dance floor at this venue is small, probably about 30-40 meters squared or so depending on how you arrange the dj booth and sound system. 

Tops and subs in the dancefloor corners might work quite well in that sized room, or the subs right in front of the dj if the booth is centered at one end, or all along a wall if hte room/dancefloor is not squared.

[Len Zenith Jr]

At our club we have speakers facing in to the dance floor from the rear. As much as I wanted to avoid that it is a necessity in our situation. We are a 300 seat room with low ceilings (10.5'). With a half full room, the main stacks can carry the room but once the place fills up I get about 25' at the most before the mids and highs dissappear,  fills are needed to fill the gap in the highs and putting delay stacks right over people's heads in the middle of the dance floor would blast some people's heads off (Or get knocked down from people's hands) so at the back facing in was the only option to even the sound field.

In small rooms like these with low ceilings, the reverbant sound field dominates and the crowd noise is almost as loud as the music. For our spl, any quieter and the crowd noise dominanates the music, any louder and you would hurts people's ears so our delay stacks continue every 25' or so throughout the bar.

Background info aside, here are my experiences using them:

Phase issues are of no real concern. With a small room and low ceilings, the highly reverbant room has so many reflections that there are so many phase issues that you don't notice them, especially once the crowd noise is factored in.

Delay however is very apparent and IMO necessary to get them to sound right, especially if there is seating near the rear speakers.

I don't run mine as loud as the mains so the focus is still up front for DJ's,  etc.

Subs will carry the room whichever way you want them. I mostly use a mono stack for top 40 type music but for edm shows we go to a split stack. Why? Because with one mono stack there isn't enough room for the dancers to get the full blast and they fight for that space. With 2 they have 2 spots and the spl is a little more sane. Plus the promoters don't give you a weird look that your speakers don't look set up right.

Ps I also use pk sound for edm shows. I assume you are somewhere in western canada?

[Ivan Beaver]

For typical nightclubs, I disagree.  There is more to the experience than simply being enveloped by the sound. 

Something Ivan has often gone on about regarding how to measure speakers, is that too close to a speaker, the box itself impacts the real-world accuracy of hte measurements when speaking of longer frequency wavelengths.  I've not had hte chance to measure this myself in smaller rooms, but I have a feeling something similar is going on which makes additional points of sound more useful with respect to 80-200hz.  Danley subs (granted, a lower frequency range), for example, are measured 10 meters away, but most nightclub dancefloors are not measured in the tens of meters.  Berghains dancefloor is only roughly 15m x 15m, and the OP might have noticed that there are 2 flown arrays, which sorta fill in zones which have too noticeable pressure zones from the rest of the areas  much closer to the groundstacks.

So let's say that side-fills do help for maintaining pressure around the dancefloor, now what?  Add delay and turn them down until highs sound like they come from the outer corners.  How wide of coverage should the sidefills have? Depends on the coverage of the corners and room itself.

As usual, there are a lot of "it depends".

As I said-in smaller space the corner approach can work-because the distances (time arrivals) are short.

But in larger rooms, it just starts to not be as clear.

I did a large room a couple of years ago as part of WMC in Miami.

The first night we had a 4 point system (the promoter insisted on having it).

All went well.

The headliner for the 2nd night INSISTED that we no only turn off the surrounds, but ALSO remove them (so as not to confuse the audience the sound guy said).

I got all sorts of comments the 2nd night about how much clearer it sounded and people asking what I did.

I told them I was using FEWER speakers, which confused a lot of them

Agree that sometimes it is more about "an experience" than a accurate reproduction of the signal.

Other times it is about accuracy.


The reason Danley measures the subs at a distance of 10m is to be able to provide accurate information in terms of specs and useful information for modeling out to large distances.

Agreed that many rooms are not that large.

In smaller rooms, the room itself is going to be a HUGE influence on the overall sound, room modes etc.

Measuring closer would provide any information that would be useful for small rooms-except that the SPL in the specs would be a little bit higher.

And if you tried to measure in a small room, it would be an exercise in futility-again due to the room modes.

[Randy Pence]

The headliner for the 2nd night INSISTED that we no only turn off the surrounds, but ALSO remove them (so as not to confuse the audience the sound guy said).

The cynic in me thinks said headliner only wanted the surround system removed so that the audience would look at him when they danced

At what point/dimensions do you consider a room large?

[ProSoundWeb Community]